Shanghai Study Trip Report: May 2018

Brimming with excitement and much animation, our group of 47 participants from malls all over Malaysia took off for Shanghai, looking forward to a great time to check out what the ‘Paris of the Orient’ had to offer.

First stop was to the city’s iconic destination at The Bund followed by a Welcome Dinner at Yilixiali Restaurant. The next 2 days were spent visiting a total of 6 malls, with a quick shopping stop at the Florentia Outlet Malls thrown in as a bonus on the last day.

There was a grand welcome from the management of Global Harbour Mall which was styled after European architecture. This was followed by Joy City, famous for a full-sized ferris wheel, billed as a ‘landmark of love’, mounted on the side of the mall and which offered rides with a tea break as well as dinner ‘in the air’. What was more interesting were the craft shops where shoppers could sign up for classes on leather craft, ceramics, woodcarving, cooking, painting and more.

At K11 Art Mall, all things were art-centric, with numerous pockets of exhibition spaces throughout the mall. The décor included expensive art pieces as well as a non-functioning quirky ‘pink washroom’ which attracted shoppers as a photo opportunity, to upload on social media.

More conventional shopping malls included Taikoo Hui, ifc mall and iapm mall. As a newly opened lifestyle mall, Taikoo Hui is well connected to public transport and is a mixed development of offices and hotels. Participants also had an optional visit to Starbucks Reserve Roastery, the biggest outlet in the world which is located here.

ifc Mall is home to several globally branded flagship stores with the mall design inspired by dazzling diamonds whilst iapm Mall, which, as the name suggest, opens early and closes late, is a luxury one-stop shop with the biggest names in fashion.

Some innovative participants even found time to visit Shanghai’s iconic Xintiandi, which combines old architecture with modern retailing and in 2 different blocks. Shanghai certainly had elements of vibrant malls, glamour and history and overall, as some participants put it, “This trip exposed me to great new ideas in mall management” and “It was a fruitful trip getting to know each other from different malls”.